CHICAGO — Lawyers for the “Broadview Six” late Tuesday asked a federal judge to appoint special counsel to investigate alleged wrongdoing by the U.S. Attorney’s Office — and possibly prosecute for contempt of court.

The 33-page motion said the investigation should focus on prosecutors’ conduct “during the grand jury proceedings and the ensuing cover-up before this court” and should include everyone who touched the case, including U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros, his top deputies, and his supervisors at the Department of Justice.

“Indeed, these steps must be taken in large part because of what appears to be a determined effort to blame a single prosecutor when the misconduct now known…runs much deeper and indeed to the highest levels of the Chicago U.S. Attorney’s Office and likely to the Department of Justice in Washington D.C.,” the motion stated.

The motion warned U.S. District Judge April Perry that if a special prosecutor was not able to dig deeper, blame for the collapse of the Broadview Six case would be laid on a single scapegoat, Assistant U.S. Attorney Sheri Mecklenburg, which would be “a convenient outcome for those who are eager to turn the page.”

“The court has the authority, and we think the obligation, to ensure that those responsible for this unique and sorry chapter— a chapter which has dramatically impacted the lives of multiple defendants and enduringly sullied the reputation of the U.S. Attorney’s Office earned over decades— are held to account,” the motion stated.

The motion concluded an untainted special counsel was necessary because the issues involved allegations of contempt and misconduct at high levels in the Justice Department.

“Obviously, no one can credibly investigate themselves,” the motion stated.

The filing was the latest shoe to drop in an evolving scandal that began to unfold last month when the politically charged case against six Operation Midway Blitz protesters melted down in dramatic fashion.

After grand jury transcripts showed what Perry called “shocking” misconduct by Mecklenburg, the prosecutor who obtained the indictment, others in the U.S. attorney’s office were accused by the defense of trying to hide it from the judge by redacting large portions of the proceedings.

Last month, Perry told prosecutors that given what occurred in the grand jury and after, claims of vindictive prosecution that she initially rejected could also deserve a second look.

“I, at the time, was operating on a presumption of regular grand jury proceedings, which these were very clearly not,” Perry said. “So based upon what I’ve seen in the grand jury transcripts, the calculus has changed and it has changed considerably.”

Perry said the defense was “entitled to a briefing and perhaps a hearing on the issue of vindictive prosecution,” in addition to sanctions for prosecutorial misconduct and for potential ethical violations.

Boutros has been at the center of the controversy that is virtually unprecedented for Chicago’s vaunted U.S. attorney’s office, long regarded as one of the country’s most professional prosecutorial offices.

A growing list of Democratic politicians have called for Boutros to step down, including both U.S. senators from Illinois, Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth, who said last week that his office has been “riddled with chaos, deep internal dysfunction, and alleged misconduct.”

Boutros, meanwhile, has defended himself and his office, acknowledging that mistakes were made in the Broadview case but claiming he didn’t know the extent of the wrongdoing before the grand jury until late April, when he immediately moved to dismiss the felony indictment and proceed only on misdemeanors.

Amid the controversy, Boutros has also been given a vote of confidence by acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche, who praised Boutros in a lengthy social media post last month for “steadfastly” advancing the White House’s mission to make the city “safe for the American people.”

The Broadview Six case was beset by allegations of political interference from the moment the indictment was brought last October, with the defense claiming there was pressure from the top to silence protesters of President Donald Trump’s immigration policies.

Prosecutors alleged the defendants were part of a group that surrounded an ICE vehicle outside the Broadview facility during a Sept. 26 protest and “banged aggressively” on the vehicle’s side and back windows, hood and doors, and crowded together to impede the vehicle.

But the case completely collapsed on May 21 after Perry was given unredacted transcripts of the grand jury proceedings and held an emergency hearing where she said she had “never seen the types of prosecutorial behavior before a grand jury” that had occurred in this case.

In addition to the request for special counsel, the defense on Tuesday filed a motion laying out potential sanctions at Perry’s disposal and the discovery requests that should be fulfilled in that pursuit, including any emails and communications within the U.S. attorney’s office about the case and anything showing potential interference from the Trump administration.

The defense motion accused the government of trying to avoid turning over those materials by agreeing up front to pay attorney’s fees for the former defendants, which “a cynical observer might suggest … was made largely to avoid having to produce the requested discovery (which appears to have struck a nerve) and a full accounting of its conduct.”

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